Preparing for a Gearhead World Tour: One Month Before Take-Off
We believe it’s so important to meet our fellow gearheads around the world, we’re blowing our race car build fund on ten days in northern Europe! And, because we’ve done this before and had such a great time doing it, we wanted to give you a look at what we’ve got planned so far, in the hopes that it might help YOU plan a trip to another part of the world to party with your international gearhead friends.
Should Breakdowns be Punished?
We’ve all been there. Rush hour. It’s hot, you just want to get home, and traffic is moving even slower than usual. Most of the slow-down is caused by rubber-neckers trying to to get a good look at that poorly maintained hooptie on the shoulder puking what’s left of its coolant or limping along on the shredded remains of that tire that’s been bald for months. Should the guy who couldn’t maintain his vehicle be fined (or jailed) for causing the traffic jam?
Build a Better EV
This story is not about “peak oil” or running out of finite resources. It’s about gearheads. EV gearheads are relatively few and far between, but they are growing in numbers by the day. Whether or not we’re going to run out of oil is irrelevant. It should be painfully obvious by now that the price of fuel is only headed one direction – up. Eventually, we’ll reach a point where our thirsty playthings only come out to play on the weekend or for special occasions. But that doesn’t mean we’ll have to buy some US$50,000 EV. We’re gearheads. We can make our own.
SMART Goals
What is a SMART goal? Really, it’s just a clever acronym, but once you’ve experienced one for yourself, it’s hard to see lesser goals as being worth your time. They aren’t always easy to come up with, but when they do – POW! – Catalina (effing) Wine Mixer. The sky’s the limit. Here’s my gearhead’s explanation of SMART goals.
The Sigmatron
No, it’s not a Transformer. No, it’s neither seeking to conquer nor save Planet Earth. But it sure sounds like it could be any of the above. It’s the Sigmatron, it’s a former concept car, and it’s literally one-of-a-kind.
FF: Why We Buy New Cars
I recently got so fed up with my 1992 Galant VR4 that I sold it. Not just sold it, but completely rebuilt it, fixing everything mechanical that was conceivably wrong with it – up to and including replacing the entire engine and transmission. When I got it all back together and ready to deliver to the new owner across town, I was blown away at just how nice “my” car really was. So why do we get fed up with our cars and move on?
Chris Essman: Road-tripping in the Race Car
Even though I retired long ago, I’m still on a distribution list for visitor message alerts on DSMtuners. If some illiterate stroke firebombs your profile over there and you slick the alert button, I get an email. Can’t do anything about it and tend to ignore them, but a morbid sense of curiosity had me clicking through on one the other day.
I’m glad I did. Today, GBXM shares the story of a gearhead building with conviction and purpose.
EV Drags at Southwestern International Raceway
Southwest International Raceway (SIR) is no stranger to electric dragsters – in early 2008, Dennis Berube’s Current Eliminator 2 dipped into the 7′s, setting a world record there - but up until Sunday, the 15th of April, 2012, the strip had not witnessed a gathering of EV Drag Racers.
#GTKY: Awesome EVs
A growing number of automakers have pure electric vehicles available these days, but EVs are still relatively scarce. And what do we – the gearheads – know about them? They’re expensive. They don’t go very far. They don’t go very fast. Most of them (at least on the American grid) are charged from coal-fired power plants, making them even dirtier than the conventional cars they replaced.
Oh, and they’re driven by tree-hugging hippies who don’t care about automotive performance.
